Of Migrant and Stayers

The Kent Ridge Commons (KRC) has a new article Migrants and Stayers. Well, it is not exactly new because the article was written more than two years ago after Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong (GCT) had said that Singapore was 'leaking talent'. Around the same time, I also offered my own perspective [link] on why Singapore was 'leaking talent'. There is a subtle but important difference between what I wrote and the KRC article. The latter concentrates on why some young Singaporeans want to leave while the former tries to explain why some Singaporeans are leaving or have left.

I'm just going to repeat myself again in this post. This is an issue that I have given much thought about over these years. After all, I left Singapore to pursue my postgraduate studies in the US and the issue is very close to my heart.

There are many reasons - social, economic and political - why many Singaporeans want to emigrate. Some people wish to leave because of the lack of political and social freedom in Singapore. Homosexuals enjoy no legal protection and we have close to no press freedom. And I can go on and on. But that's unlikely to be the main reason why people leave. Make no mistake about it: I support gay rights and I value press freedom but I am not going to say that these things are why people are leaving.

Let us consider another small country with a similar population size and a English-speaking population - New Zealand. New Zealand undeniably offers more political and social freedoms than Singapore. Nevertheless, a large proportion of their university undergraduates choose to leave NZ for Australia for sheer availability of economic opportunities. It can't be that Australia fares much better in terms of human right, can it?

Therefore, it is not difficult to understand why many Singaporeans are emigrating. In the pursuit of economic developement, we have become very much westernized over the past decades. This very high level of westernization is a result of a deliberate government policy to attract western MNCs. After all, well-trained English-speaking workers make a perfect fit to the labour needs of investors from Australia/UK/USA, much like the workers in their own countries but cheaper. The government built an English-medium education system, emphasized engineering and technical training and developed the use of information technology. Mind you, it did and still does not do this out of pure altruism or familial love for its people. Let's be clear about it: the purpose is to attract investors.

A consequence, intended or unintended, is that many young Singaporeans have become a good fit to the labour needs of MNCs... and of their home countries. That engineering diploma, which was good enough for the American MNC, has become good enough for an American company operating out of California. This means that Singaporeans have better prospects to emigrate. Singaporeans have become a much better fit to the world or to see it another way, the world has become a better fit to Singaporeans. The rest of the world has become much more comfortable - economically, socially and culturally - for Singaporeans. The catchword is 'globalization'.

Many people underestimate the difficulties of emigration. First of all, emigration involves cultural uprooting. The US, which is one of the most welcoming socities, can be difficult for an immigrant to assimilate into, especially for an Asian. I have met Koreans, Malaysians, Thai, Chinese and Japanese students who have told me that they feel out of place in the wider American society and desire to return to their home countries after spending a few years in the US. Indians don't seem to have that problem - their home country is already highly westernized (for different reasons) and they are accustomed to living in a messy complex democratic society. Fortunately, or unfortunately, Singapore's Asian culture has been drastically blanched to westernize our work force. (I confess to being one of the highly westernized.) The loss of the inclination towards cultural protectionism has led to the increased propensity of Singaporeans to emigrate.

In summary, Singaporeans are showing a greater wilingness and ability to emigrate because of the socio-cultural transformation triggered by our economic development policy. By making Singaporeans into workers more desirable for MNCs, the government has also inadvertently moulded them into better emigrants.

I hope that what I have written has shed some light on Singaporean emigration. I welcome all comments. In particular, I will like to know how Singapore should respond to the trend of increasing emigration.

Come together?

This is the logo of NDP 2009. No kidding. I'm not bluffing you.

Come together? Five fingers of democracy, peace, progress, justice and equality? Reaching up? Five fingers reaching up? Was there no one in the committee that designed this who foresaw the potential for sexual innuendos and schoolboy snickers?

They told us that we had to stand up for Singapore but this is ridiculous!

ST: Spore's population is 4.84 million

From the Straits Times on 17 June 2009:

SINGAPORE'S population grew 5.5 per cent last year to reach 4.84 million, due largely to the influx of foreigners. The number of residents, that is, Singapore citizens and permanent residents (PR), rose 1.7 per cent to 3.64 million in June last year, said a report released by the National Population Secretariat (NPS) on Wednesday. There were 79,167 new PRs in 2008 - up 15, 540 from 63,627 the previous year and 20,513 new citizens, an increase of 3,179 from 17,334 over the same period. More than half of the new residents aged 20 and above had at least post-secondary education which shows that Singapore continues to attract talented foreigners. With more foreigners settling in Singapore, NPS said it has become 'more important' to help them integrate. NPS also said that Singapore continues to face the long-term demographic challenge of low fertility and ageing population. Singapore's total feritility rate of 1.28 in 2008 remained below the replacement level of 2.1. The proportion of residents aged 65 years and above also continues to increase to 8.7 per cent last year from 6.8 per cent in 1998. These trends underscore the need to 'continue working on long-term strategies to build a sustainable population, in spite of the economic downturn', added NPS. NPS also continues to engage thousands of Singaporeans who are overseas for work and studies through its Overseas Singaporean Unit to help them stay connected with home. As of June last year, there were more than 180,000 Singaporeans overseas.

Wow, over 50 percent of the new PRs over 20 in Singapore have at least post-secondary education and the ST calls our foreign talent policy a success in attracting talented people.

On the other hand, over 80 percent of each P1 cohort in Singapore go on to attend ITE, Polytechnic and Pre-University.

We the people of Singapore must be uber-talented.

And to the talents in Singapore Press Holdings, keep up the good work in nation-building.

The MSG scare

I am pissed.

The blogger at the boy who knew too much claims that, in his own words, that he has a heightened sensitivity to Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) and that many westerners experience the 'Chinese Restaurant Syndrome' when eating MSG-laden food. In particular, based on absolutely no rigorous medical research, he believes that Chinese people have some special ability to clear MSG from their system due to genetic adaptation whereas westerners don't.

This is of course bunkum because:

1. Glutamates occur naturally in food, especially fermented/aged ones like soy sauce, fish sauce, ripe tomatoes, meat, and Parmesan cheese. The Italians get on fine with tomatoes and cheese.
2. Our bodies make glutamate on its own and breast milk is especially high in glutamate to entice babies to suckle.
3. MSG was only chemically isolated in the 20th century. Hence, its use as a food additive started only in the 20th century. Pray tell, how did Chinese people adapt to something they have only started adding to their food barely a century ago?
4. Marmite, frequently cited as the most-missed foodstuff by British expatriates (of whom the blogger is one), is a yeast-extract that contains very high concentrations of glutamates, much more than soy sauce. They use it on their toasts and in their soups. Mysteriously, you never hear about the Brits feeling dizzy or getting headaches from their beloved Marmites. Ditto for Vegemite, the perennial Australian favourite.
5. Glutamates are used extensively in flavouring chips, crisps, fast food, canned soups, etc, all of which are consumed in copious amounts in the UK. Apparently, one never hears of the Brits suffering from an epidemic of the so-called Chinese Restaurant Syndrome.

Moral of the day: Don't make baseless claims about something you know squat about, even if you have many gifts (or so you claim). Ching Chong also has access to the internet.

The Kent Ridge Common

I must say that I am impressed by this new independent student daily from the National University of Singapore. I wish I had something like this to read during my time in NUS. As an undergraduate in NUS many years ago, I found the student publication like The Ridge to be feeble and boring. Instead of addressing pertinent issues like scholarships for foreigners, ways to improve undergraduate science education and NS service obligations for undergraduates, The Ridge, which I only read very occasionally, would concern itself with mundane issues like the allocation of ECA points or the frequency of shuttle buses. Most of my classmates did not even realize that The Ridge existed as it was largely irrelevant to their university lives. The Kent Ridge Commons is refreshingly different.

I'm definitely subscribing to its RSS feed.